As 2024 comes to a close, people look back to evaluate their lives and ponder what can be done in 2025 to achieve a more fulfilling life. As you do so, you may find yourself wondering: Why do you have wonderful things in life—maybe a fulfilling career, a loving family, a cozy home—but These things are likely to have only a limited impact on your daily happiness. ?
At the same time, there can be not-so-great things all around us – relationship rifts, online rudeness, ineffectiveness at work – and it seems we often get used to these ills. so less likely to try to change them. .
In other words, we stop paying attention to what has always been there. Here's how you can change that.
Recognize habits
Habituation is a fundamental characteristic of our brains – the tendency to respond less and less to regular or frequent things.
Imagine you are walking into a coffee shop. At first the aroma of freshly brewed coffee is very prominent, but after about 20 minutes, you can no longer smell the aroma. Your olfactory neurons stop responding – they become habitual. And once you get used to the smell of coffee, you can also get used to the more complicated aspects of your life.
The challenge then is to regain sensitivity, both to the wonderful things in life, so that we can feel joy, and to the terrible things that we no longer realize we can Change if you try. So how do we dis. disget acquainted?
Say goodbye to the good things
The answer lies in this wonderful quote from economist Tibor Scitovsky: “Pleasure is the result of incomplete and intermittent satisfaction of desires.”
Consider a song you like—would you enjoy it more if you listened to it continuously from start to finish or with short breaks? Ninety-nine percent of people say “no” to taking breaks. However, study found that people liked a song more when they listened to it during their break. Why? If you listen to a song continuously, the joy it brings at first will decrease over time. However, interruptions cause loss of habit, so every time the song plays, the level of fun increases.
To combat habit and maximize joy, we need to consume the good things in life a little at a time. Whether it's a Netflix show, a chocolate cake, or a new romance—enjoy, not binge.
Swallow all the bad things
On the other hand, if you need to complete an unpleasant task—housework, admin work—complete it in one go. Study showed that people were less distressed if they had to constantly hear an unpleasant noise (such as a vacuum cleaner) than when they took a break. If you constantly hear the noise, the “pain” it causes at first will gradually decrease over time. However, the disruption causes a loss of routine, so each time the noise returns, the level of distress increases.
Experiment in life
What about those aspects of your life that you suspect may be causing stress and anxiety, but you can't really know how much they're affecting you because they're always there, so you don't try to change them? they? They loom in the background like the constant hum of an air conditioner—you don't realize how much of a negative impact that noise is having until someone turns it off and suddenly you feel much better. .
Consider social media: Is it having a negative impact on you? In one learnresearchers paid half of the participants $100 each to leave the social media platform for a month, while the other half continued life as usual. At the end of the experiment, the “quit” group felt happier and less stressed. The most important thing is that they were surprised. They don't realize the negative impact this platform has on them.
In 2025, test life. Eliminate some elements from your daily routine for a while, one at a time, and add some other new elements. Measure and evaluate the impact on your life so you can keep the traits that bring happiness and purpose, while eliminating those that don't.